Apologies in advance but this might be bit of a ramble. Today is the Mairangi Bay Food & Wine Festival - or in our case Mostly Wine Festival.
Greeted as we have been by the almost perfect weather - 25ºC and almost cloudless skies - the answer to the question on all our lips: "Are we going to the food and wine on the beach?", was, of course: "It would be rude not to". Think my punctuation might have gone a bit off there, but ask me if I care? And sorry about the cap - sun was burning my neck!
So here we are, in early Fall, on what is probably the perfect Summer day back home, drinking New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc by the bucketful, eating spring rolls and greek salad, listening to some live tunes (no idea what), and watching the local fashion show.
And all with two of my favourite people. Not sure it gets much better than this.
Entry free but, rather cunningly, the organisers require you to buy a "glass" for 20 bucks on entry which can then be refilled (several times, at about 10 bucks a pop) with good old NZ plonk (actually I don't think they make any plonk). I've already made an impression on the locals as they trusted me to return with payment after all my cards failed to cut the mustard with the EFTPOS machines (no, I've no idea what that means). But free wine was the result, until we managed to scrape enough cash together - really must go to an ATM soon!
But meanwhile, the fashion show...
Don't think this a professional set up, judging by the whoops and hollers generated by anyone whose family was there (pretty much everyone I think). Brilliant! We tried but failed to get Nareesa on the stage!
Apparently the "set" of 3 "souvenir" glasses is my birthday present! Not the worst I've ever had; my youngest brother once bought me an inflatable model of the space shuttle for Christmas - but that is another story.
Having greeted Michelle to our home from home yesterday we have, as ever, barely stopped talking (or that might just be me) and drinking (definitely not just me). With 5 days of this my vocal chords, or possibly my liver, might just pack up.
This morning (possibly to get away from me) Nareesa and Mich, set off for the hour or so ramble up the coast to Brown's Bay. Hopalong, took the car to meet them at the now infamous Stoned Cow for the umpteenth coffee of this trip. I think New Zealand has even more coffee shops per capita than we do. And without wanting to big this place up too much, they crossed 3 fabulous beaches on the way - in an hour!
Stairway to Heaven
Not sure what the right hand is doing!
So, with apologies for writing with this much wine in me, that will do for today. To massively understate it, this is not the worst day of my life. I am grateful - for it all! And given this is Drunken Selfie Day in New Zealand, here are a few more...
Oh dear!
Pick the bigger eejet
Serious! Music, or maybe fashion?
Good to know. I'd hate think there was going to be a mess left. (Not a selfie, obvs!)
Bonny!
There appear to be a lot of shots of you, Alan, ony only a few of Moth. Despite the distance covered and your opportunity to self reflect, nothing seems to have changed...
Excellent - so glad you went along and that it was a lovely day. However, can’t help thinking that, given what happened to Challenger and Columbia, it’s maybe in dubious taste to talk about a blow-up model of the Space Shuttle. Just sayin’ …… 😃
(Anyway, we’ve got sun today too - so there!)